Nu?—Neuter Nouns
When I asked my mom o”h what she knew
about grammar, she answered, “What do
you want to know about bobe (granma)?”

On the next page is a list of neuter nouns.
Yiddish nouns usually are only masculine,
feminine or neuter. Unlike English many
languages have genders for their nouns
(names of people, places or things). A
common neuter noun in Yiddish is kind
(child, plural kinder). How do we say the
child? It all depends, for there are four
Yiddish words for the English word the.
They are; di, der, dos and dem. It is easy
for plurals, for we always use di (di kinder).

Let us simplify things, for if we are speaking
of only one child, we use either dos or
dem—never di or der. This is true for all the
words on the next page. Here are examples.

The child is here. Dos kind iz do.

I see the child. Ikh ze dos kind.

The child’s book is here. Dem kinds bukh iz do.

I bring the child a book. Ikh breng dem kind a bukh.

There are groups of words that are neuter
nouns and act like kind. They are country
names, towns, metals and diminutives or
affectionate (often ending in ele). It is
interesting that Northeastern Yiddish does
not use the neuter, but assigns them to
either masculine or feminine. So if you
never use dos for the English the, you may
be using Northeastern Yiddish.

Another reason to know the gender relates
to the ending of words that change the
meaning of the noun (the adjective). The
ending of an adjective changes depending
on which form of the one uses.

There is a one to one correspondence.
With der you add er
With di or dos you add e
With dem you add n or en

Add a describing word good to each
sentence, and see how it is changed.

The good child is here. Dos gute kind iz do.
I see the good child. Ikh ze dos gute kind.
The good child’s book is here. Dem gutn
kinds bukh iz do.
I bring the good child the book. Ikh breng
dem gutn kind dos bukh.
The Yiddish words a and an are spelled and
used exactly as they are in English. When
using a or an the describing word is not
changed—good is gut.

A good child is here. A gut kind iz do.
A good child’s book is here. A gut kinds
bukh iz do.